"I Was Here Before Angels"
Sashira
No more to use the sky forever but live with famine
And pain a few days . . . ."
- "Hurt Hawks", Robinson Jeffers
A bird with a broken wing is a pitiful thing. They look strong,
wings, but hollow bones snap like driftwood when given a sharp shock.
Flying is always uncertain, dependent on reading the air like a book
and guessing which winds will support weight. When a bird guesses
wrong - they fall, and they break.
They may then live for a few days, if it can be called living.
Instinct tells them that they must die, and so with inhuman serenity
they allow their soul to slip away . . . and they wait. Being half a
bird and half a woman, Valiha not only knew that she must die, but
understood it well enough to dread it.
She lay helplessly in the ditch, stagnant water eddying around her
when she twitched weakly. One of her wings was snapped straight
through - she could see the gruesome shape beneath the feathers from
where she rested. The other was bent beneath her; she couldn't tell
whether the pain was permanent or caused by the awkward angle. She
couldn't move far enough to roll off of it, couldn't even raise her
hand to brush her hair away from her face. Somehow, that was the worst
of it. She could barely blink, but when she did the hair tortured her
eyes.
Soon, that didn't matter any more. As she lost blood she lost the
will even to blink, and her eyes stayed closed. Her mind wandered
away, replaying the accident - the slipped thermal, the spin out of
control, the speeding truck that had clipped her and tossed her like a
leaf. The driver wasn't to blame, of course - he hadn't even seen her.
No one was to blame. She decided that this, after all, was the very
worst of it. Knowing this, she found some peace and managed to fall
into unconsciousness. If she could help it, she would die in her
sleep.
A strange sound snapped her to alertness, and she muzzily realized
that it was more of a lack of sound - the noise of an engine dying.
She heard a door open and slam, hurriedly, and quick footsteps bent the
dry grass as something rushed towards her. Her nostrils flared - it
was a human, a young male, full of adrenaline. She tried to move to
defend herself, but the white pain allowed only a moan to escape. She
forced her eyes open and glared at the man with fierce, predatory
madness. She might be doomed, but she'd be damned if she'd let this
soft, ground-walking creature kill her. She had her pride . . . she
would do something . . . .
"Jesus," said the man, respectfully. He knelt swiftly beside her,
and through the haze Valiha realized that he looked concerned. When he
spoke next, his voice was gentle. "What happened to you, darling?"
"Truck," she managed to say, surprising herself. Her tongue was
thick; the word was barely a word. She added in a whisper, "I fell."
She was too tired to wonder why the man could see her at all.
"Can you move your fingers?" he asked. She twitched them
obediently. "Good, and your toes?" She flexed her bare feet, and
he saw. 'His eyes see almost as well as mine,' she thought.
'But what do fingers and toes matter when my wings will never work
again?'
She flinched when he touched her, and screamed. The sound was not
human, but he didn't notice. He just kept softly touching her body,
counting bones. When he was done, he cheerfully said, "Well, nothing
seems to be broken, but we're going to have to stop that bleeding. Do
you know where you're bleeding from, honey?"
"Valiha," she whispered.
"What?"
"Not honey," she explained. "Valiha." She couldn't concentrate
enough to give herself strength through magic, but hope has a magic of
its own. She forced herself to focus on his face, and smiled in the
human way.
"Oh - that's your name?" He quickly added, "I'm Jack, Valiha-honey,
but you call me whatever you want. Everyone else does." He smiled
reassuringly, and said, "Now where are you bleeding from? Is it your
back?"
Wearily, Valiha showed him. It was a relief, letting down her
defenses. It took no effort at all to show people her wings - save the
effort of overriding a survival imperative she'd learned over
centuries.
A sharp hiss of breath was his only answer, and he stood silent for a
moment. Then he said in a far-off voice, as if he was dreaming, "We'll
need to splint that before we can get you anywhere." He opened a box
and took out some cloth, which he pressed firmly to her right wing.
This time her scream shook him - his eyes rolled in fear before he
controlled himself. This time, he'd heard it for what it was.
Shaking his head, he bound the soft cloth firmly to the wound with
something sticky. He gently turned her so her spine was straight,
freeing the trapped wing. She gave a soft sigh as the pressure was
relieved.
"You - taking me somewhere?" she asked suspiciously.
"Well, I hate to move you without a stretcher," he said. "But the
ambulance will be here any minute, and I doubt you want them to see you
looking like this." She didn't understand the words, but his tone was
urgent. She decided to trust him, if it was a choice between him or an
unknown evil.
She lay passively as he tied her right wing to a dry stick, snapped
from the bracken surrounding her. He lifted her, jerking her a bit
before he realized that she weighed half as much as a human. She
leaned against his chest, letting him carry her to the car. It was a
little car, a different species than the monster truck.
He settled her in the seat beside his, lying her down as far as the
seat would go, and then worked the magic to make the car move. Valiha
felt the wind rush by through the window, fast as flying. Tears leaked
from her eyes, running silently down her face.
He noticed anyway, this human who noticed so much. He said
conversationally, "So, are you an angel?" He looked dubiously at her
wings, banded brown and black like her hair. That was the part they
could never believe, curse them! A woman with wings was acceptable,
but God help you (the God of the Jews, that is) if those wings weren't
white. The world had moved on when she wasn't looking, and she was
trapped in the form she had been given by the Old People. Angel, that
was a word she knew, a word that people kept throwing at her these
days. It did her no good to be believed in if people didn't understand
what they were seeing.
But this man had helped her, so she tried to explain anyway. "No,
not an angel. I - I was here before angels." He nodded, accepting
this. "I - back when there were more trees -"
"We can talk more about it when you're feeling better," he said, and
turned a knob that made beautiful music come from the car.
"When I'm feeling better," Valiha repeated, trying out the phrase.
She liked it. "Angel," she murmured, and fell back asleep, dreaming of
clouds and winds as the car flew her to safety.
[Valiha is loosely based on a story of the pre-European northwest
coast, of animal-people that decided at the dawn of time whether to
live as humans or animals. Valiha never picked one or the other, and
has been confused ever since. Her name is a random collection of
syllables that sounded right.
Powers (when well): Shapeshifting from human to hawk, any shape in
between possible. Appearing as people want to see/not see her (which I
shamelessly stole from Peter Beagle's "The Last Unicorn"). Has
learned to channel magic to give her wings strength, allowing her to
fly even in forms that should be impossible. Excellent sensory
perception, especially sight.
Weaknesses: Trouble understanding any event that occurs in less than a
decade; ignorance of technology and modern ways; torn by instincts and
intellect. Has trouble deciding things quickly unless the decision is
one that comes naturally to a hawk. Pride. Heals as slowly as humans
- or hurt hawks.
"Jack" is either going to be a friend or love interest of hers.
He's a human with an unrealized magical talent for sensing injuries,
and is thoughtful enough to perceive spirits a little. He is not a
doctor or EMT, but he had a first aid class in college that got him
thinking; this is the first time he has significantly used his
abilities.]